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This mourning for: Isn't it what we immediately encounter in every request for analysis? Can't one claim here that this demand always masks a secret passion, misconstrued and hanging on an unuttered word?
This enigmatic film title — Melancholia — is a psychoanalytic term and, like “Hysteria,” it has not survived postmodern psychoanalytic narratives yet continues to powerfully convey a form of suffering not present in our current diagnostic manual. Perhaps this is because, as Hassoun (1997) tells us: “For Freud, melancholia is a malady of the Ego, occurring precisely where the death drive is inscribed” (p. 6). And the death drive is arguably the darkest and most stubborn riddle posed by the legacy of psychoanalysis. This remarkable film is full of riddles, not limited to the staged party game